The Totality Art Movement Manifesto
FOUNDING DOCUMENT
EST. 2026
The Totality Art Movement
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A Manifesto of Purpose, Lineage, and Preparation
THE LINEAGE
This movement did not begin with this declaration. It indirectly began in 1893, in the Bronx, when a father placed a pencil in the hand of his three-year-old son — Charles Claude Buck — and something started that would not finish for more than a century.
Claude Buck trained at the National Academy of Design, co-founded the Introspectives in 1917 — one of the first proto-surrealist groups in America, with their debut exhibition at the Whitney Studio Gallery in New York — taught at the Art Institute of Chicago where he took over the classes of George Bellows, was a leading member of the avant-garde Symbolism movement in Chicago, won the Logan Medal, and spent eight decades insisting that art had a responsibility to the soul of the viewer. His papers are held in the Smithsonian Archives of American Art, and several of his works of art are in the permanent collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
In 1962, a former professional baseball player named Don Paulson — who had received a D grade in his only art class and had never held a brush — walked into 72-year-old Claude Buck's backyard in Santa Barbara. Claude looked at him and said: "Let's see if we can make a great artist out of you in a year."
Don Paulson became Buck Paulson — carrying the name his master gave him freely, after painting his very first painting with him. As a full time artist, he taught art classes in his studio beginning in 1970, taught workshops across the country and in Dubai and Canada, sold paintings through prestigious galleries, and has taught painting on PBS television since 1988. He continues to paint in his Santa Barbara studio at the age of ninety-one.
Timothy Paulson was born into this story. Raised in his father's home and studio with a paintbrush in his hand. At eleven years old, he stood in Claude Buck's studio and received something he has spent a lifetime responding to. He holds a Master of Divinity (MDiv) from Liberty University, and a Doctor of Ministry (DMin) from Emory University. He is an international speaker. He is the author of this book. And he is the founder of this movement.
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THE FOUNDING TRIPTYCH
At the heart of this movement are three paintings — a founding triptych. Each is a stage of preparation. Together they form a visual curriculum for the soul.
Decision — Buck Paulson, 1970
A man alone. Christ quietly behind him. The weight of a choice that cannot be deferred. Matthew, Andrew, Peter, James — they left their nets at once. The rich young ruler walked away. The difference was not the call. It was the decision. This painting is that moment, held still. Decide.
The Young Michelangelo — Claude Buck, 1967
A portrait of a young painter with Michelangelo above his shoulder. Painted by the master who looked at his student and saw Michelangelo, and who wrote: "with confidence that you will become an eminent painter." God said to Jeremiah, “Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee.” God sees not what you are but what you can become. Receive your calling.
Rise from the Dust— Timothy Paulson. 2011
A seven-dollar yard sale painting — dusty, forgotten, not valued — transformed into a work priced at one million dollars. A type of the resurrection. No one is so buried they cannot rise. Arise, exercise faith, repent, shine, for your light has come. Rise from the dust.
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THE VISION
The movement's defining vision is Totality — a total solar eclipse, the corona blazing. The corona is not the moon's own light. It is the sun's glory, visible only at the moment of complete alignment — when the soul has moved, fully and finally, into the position it was always made to inhabit.
Here the corona represents Christ's light. The alignment is yours to choose. And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord's glory, are being transformed into His image.
This is the destination the triptych points toward. This is what we are preparing for.
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WE BELIEVE
✦ Jesus Christ is returning.
✦ All should prepare now.
✦ The triptych is a tool of preparation for the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.
✦ Calling must be received and acted upon — not merely admired.
✦ The corona blazes only through complete alignment with Christ.
✦ In Christ, the old things pass away, and all things become new — no life is too buried, too damaged, too sinful, or too forgotten to be remade.
✦ The words every soul was made to receive are these: "Well done, thou good and faithful servant." This movement is about helping as many people as possible to hear those words.
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THEREFORE
We not only make art for galleries, museums, homes, and for souls. We also make art for the moment that is coming. Art that stops people, asks something of them, and sends them away changed.
Other paintings by Claude Buck, Buck Paulson, and Timothy Paulson will be added to this movement over time — only Timothy Paulson will bring them to light by selecting works that illuminate the path of preparation, that point toward the holy, and that ask something of the soul standing before them. The triptych is its foundation. What follows will build on it with the same purpose.
We believe this movement grows in two directions simultaneously — outward through paintings brought to light, and inward through souls being formed. Every person who encounters this movement, decides, exercises faith in Christ, receives their calling, rises, repents, and aligns more fully with Christ becomes part of what this movement is. Not an audience. A participant. Not a viewer. A work. The paintings are instruments. The prepared soul is the point. The triptych is the foundation. The people are the future.
We know this movement is not the final word on preparation for the Second Coming — only brushstrokes of it. Preparing for the return of Jesus Christ is one of the great subjects of human history, and no single book, no single movement, no single artist could exhaust it. What this triptych offers is a beginning. The door is open. There is more to come.
We invite every person who encounters this movement — whether standing before a painting in person, in the pages of this book, or in the presence of the vision it carries — to receive what is being offered. Not information, but formation. Not inspiration, but transformation. Not only a reason to admire, but a reason to prepare.
We invite galleries, museums, and arts institutions to bring this movement to their audiences — and to participate in the preparation it carries.
Decide. Recognize your calling. Rise from the dust.Move into alignment. Let the corona blaze.Prepare to hear:
"Well done, thou good and faithful servant."
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The names that follow represent the artists of this movement.
Claude Buck is honored separately for the life and work that made this movement possible.
Timothy Paulson
Doctor of Ministry · Painter · Speaker · Author ·
Founder, The Totality Art Movement
Buck Paulson
Master Artist · Student of Claude Buck, 1962–1974 ·
PBS Instructor since 1988
Throughout his life, Claude Buck founded and joined movements he believed in. He would have believed in this one. His inclusion here as a founding member is not sentiment. It is lineage.
IN HONOR OF
Claude Buck (1890–1974)
Introspectives · Society for Sanity in Art · Art Institute of Chicago · Smithsonian Archives of American Art
The root from which this movement grows.
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Art made for souls. A movement made for this moment.
The Totality Art Movement · Est. 2026
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